


I Don't Have a Module For This

by little mouse (lcwilkie)



Category: The Murderbot Diaries - Martha Wells
Genre: Mild Swearing, though its muderbot so that's to be expected
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:48:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27074509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lcwilkie/pseuds/little%20mouse
Summary: Amena has a conversation with ART and Murderbot about their roles in Three's new life.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 72





	I Don't Have a Module For This

**Author's Note:**

> So...I finished Network Effect today, about three hours ago. I loved it and am not quite ready to get out of that universe and back to the real world, so have a quickly written very short fic about a conversation that may or may not be in character? Not sure. Figured I'd write it and post it before I could second guess myself, so here it is! Anyways. Enjoy!

“2.0 died. And was also me, with all my memories and information,” I said to Amena.

_Most of your memory,_ ART chimed in, spectacularly unhelpfully as usual.

“You shut up,” I told it. “We are nowhere close to being parents.” I continued, directing that last bit to Amena. Well, the wall behind Amena. But she knew I was talking to her. Mensah had had a chat with her once everything calmed down and everyone was on the same page or whatever.

“The death of a child doesn’t negate the role of parent. But I’m not talking about Murderbot 2.0,” Amena said. “I’m talking about Three.”

ART was noticeably silent in the feed for about three seconds. Just before I could say anything, it said _We did not aid in the creation of Three. Three was it’s own entity that has since been freed from outside control._

“Well yeah, but Three’s a bit like a child, really. Not really sure what it wants to do and needs to learn how to make it’s own decisions and learn how to interact with people and the world. And, I suppose, other systems. You know, how to talk to other MedSystems and SecSystems and stuff. And, technically, since Muderbot 2.0 gave those abilities to Three, and you two created Murderbot 2.0, you sort-of put Three in that position. It wouldn’t exist in it’s current state without your input.”

“That still doesn’t make us it’s parents!” I exclaimed after ART failed to say anything. “We aren’t responsible for it! ART isn’t even supposed to be anything other than a basic dumb bot, and one construct can’t own another,” I said. I think I was irritated? I don’t know, being reminded of Me 2.0 being dead but also doing things I wouldn’t have even though they were usually good decisions still made weird feelings in me. Like when I thought ART was dead, but less because I hadn’t really known it except for the few minutes down on the planet, and also more because it had been me? Fuck it, I’m still trying to work through it all. I hate emotions.

“Oh come on. Surely you see the similarities here.”

_We may have assisted Three in reaching it’s current state of being_ , ART jumped back in to the conversation, in the private feed between it, me, and Amena, _but as SecUnit said, there are several difference between our situation and a typical parent-child relationship. We had no input on Three’s consciousness or physical state, and are only tangentially responsible for it’s future education and actions._

“Alright, alright, you didn’t do the whole ‘direct creation of another being’ thing. But surely you see how it’s like…people adopting a child? Three’s too smart to be like a puppy or kitten. And is very much like a human kid right now, looking to you two for advice and information on how to function, as the only other beings in a situation similar to it.” I could see Amena look directly at me through the drone camera I had aimed at her face.

I was staring at the wall past her. I could feel ART flipping through my storage to see if there was any media to help interpret Amena’s comment. I think both of us were a bit….I don’t know, confused? Adoption was something I’d heard of, but mostly on older serials. In a society where multi-partner marriages were common, there wasn’t much difference between your kid or a partner’s kid, or someone else’s entirely, except for keeping track of medical records. And even then, most Med Systems could give you any information you needed.

Orphans were, in my experience in the Corporation Rim, turned into indentured servants as soon as someone could finish signing the paperwork, if they weren’t already born into that position.

_There might be some similarities_ ART said. Traitorous bastard. I sent him an angry ping through our secure feed. I mean the secure feed between just ART and I, not the one with Amena in it. It pinged back a clip from one of the first episodes _Finding The Lost Colony_ , a semi-realistic historical fiction serial we’d started but never gotten that into. The clip showed a couple arguing about the ethics of keeping a child they’d found in an adrift escape pod, and how they couldn’t necessarily legally adopt it because they didn’t know the actual status of the kid’s parents.

“Well, you both admit you need to help Three figure out the world it’s now living in, yes?” Amena asked, looking at me, then up at the ceiling to include ART.

_Yes,_ ART said. I just nodded.

“And you both agree that Three wouldn’t be having to sort that out if not for 2.0’s involvement?”

Another affirmative from both of us.

“ _And_ you recognize that you two created 2.0 by combining code and it was, for all intents and purposes, offspring of your interaction?” ART hesitated about 0.7 of a second before replying with another affirmative. I was also pretty damn worried about her choice of the word “offspring” as opposed to “child,” given the connotations of both, but she wasn’t entirely wrong, so I nodded again.

“So, then,” Amena said, looking rather smug, and still doing that adolescent human thing of not letting things fucking go, “if we take all those things together, you two created a self aware and self directed being that then assisted in the creation of _another_ self aware and self directed being, that is now dependant on you for protection and education, to a certain extent. Possibly more so than Murderbot 2.0, since, like SecUnit said, Murderbot 2.0 was essentially SecUnit, and therefore already knew what it was doing. Which means you two are, depending on how you interpret things, either foster parents or grandparents to Three. Your choice on how to handle that.”

Amena stood up and flounced away out the door. I saw her go through the drone feed, though that was currently backburned. I was spending a lot of processing power trying to work through what she’d said, and could feel ART looming in the feed doing the same. I was also trying to figure out why her little speech and its resulting calculations had caused a performance drop of three percent and made my organic parts shaky and sweaty.

_She is….not completely off base_ ART said in our private connection.

“No shit,” I replied.

Neither ART nor I said anything for another few seconds. We were sharing calculations and processing power and coming to very similar, and very fucking disturbing, conclusions.

“Three does get some say in this,” I said, trying to find some other way out.

_But, ignoring the physical creation aspect, would it really object to Amena’s comment on the similarities between humans fostering or adopting a child?_

I thought for about six eternities, though my internal clock said it was really only about four seconds.

“So what do we _do?_ ”

Without a word, ART went through its personal storage as uploaded by its humans and the files in the university library, and started a download of all parenting and child-raising books it could find.

**Author's Note:**

> Well that was a thing. I've skimmed it for glaring spelling or grammar errors, but apologies if I missed any.


End file.
